First sentence: “It has been sixty-four years since the president and the Consortium identified love as a disease, and forty-three since the scientistFirst sentence: “It has been sixty-four years since the president and the Consortium identified love as a disease, and forty-three since the scientists perfected a cure.”

P. 99: “Maybe he’s only regretful for the things he lost after the cure.”

Last sentence: “They cannot take it.”

Again this is a book I heard so much about both on Twitter and on many bookblogs, that I really wanted to read it, and when I had the opportunity to get it through NetGalley, I didn’t hesitate.

And I was glad I read it. I think you could consider this as a modern version of 1984 by George Orwell. A society where everything is regulated by the government, where everyone is cured on his or her 18th birthday from the dangerous disease love, and where people live their lives without emotions, without anxiety, and so on. But, as Lena discovers in the months leading to her 18th birthday, also without freedom and real happiness. Because, feeling happiness is only possible when one can feel unhappy too.

At first the idea of a society like the one described in this book seems far-fetched. But once you start to think about it, you’ll realize, at least I did, that a lot of people would consent to such a thing willingly, if they were brainwashed to do so. And you would have to have a lot of courage to not go with the flow. Scary thought.

This book is the first of a trilogy; I certainly will read the other two books. I want to know what happens to Lena....more

First sentence: “Clare Vengel tossed a leg over her Triumph and kicked it into gear.”

P. 99: “Your ideas for the society are small-minded and not nearlFirst sentence: “Clare Vengel tossed a leg over her Triumph and kicked it into gear.”

P. 99: “Your ideas for the society are small-minded and not nearly radical enough to be considered other than mainstream.”

Last sentence: But she did plan to stop and say hello.”

I heard so much about this book on Twitter and on book blogs that I got curious. Thanks to NetGalley, I was able to read it. And it sure was a fun read. The short chapters make you want to read on and on… Perhaps Clare, who is sent undercover to a university, is not the greatest detective in the world, but since this is the first book in what will become a series, I think she will grow with later assignments. And I think that is how it would be in the ‘real world’....more

First sentence: “He was staring at her cleavage and she tried to be cool, like she did this kind of thing all the time.”

P. 99: “But she no longer hadFirst sentence: “He was staring at her cleavage and she tried to be cool, like she did this kind of thing all the time.”

P. 99: “But she no longer had a clear recollection of what he had looked like when she was a child.”

Last sentence: “She knew he wouldn’t let go.”

Again a fun, quick read, and a pageturner. Robbie Ivy sees her father again after 18 years and he tells her some shocking but also exciting news that starts a series of events that gets the adrenaline up.

Although I never had any interest in going to Florida, where the story is set, Potts describes it in such a way that I thought of getting on a plane immediately to see it and feel the atmosphere there for myself (or is this perhaps caused by the lack of sun and warmth here in Belgium at the moment?).

Anyway, I loved this book and read it in two days. When you are looking for a fun read, don’t hesitate, read Someone’s Watching!

First sentence: "When a large object falls from a great height, the speed at which it travels accelerates until the upward force of air resistance becFirst sentence: "When a large object falls from a great height, the speed at which it travels accelerates until the upward force of air resistance becomes equal to the downward propulsion of gravity."

P. 99: "One of the masked twats actually had a video camera, and for a second fury got the better of fear."

Last sentence: "Without taking my eyes of Joesbury's torch, I give PC Leffingham my hand and let him lead me safely back down to earth."

From the author's website: When a Cambridge university student dramatically attempts to take her own life, DI Mark Joesbury realizes that the university has developed an unhealthy record of young people committing suicide in extraordinary ways.

Despite huge personal misgivings, Joesbury sends young policewoman DC Lacey Flint to Cambridge with a brief to work undercover, posing as a vulnerable, depression-prone student.

Psychiatrist Evi Oliver is the only person in Cambridge who knows who Lacey really is - or so they both hope. But as the two women dig deeper into the darker side of university life, they discover a terrifying trend...

And when Lacey starts experiencing the same disturbing nightmares reported by the dead girls, she knows that she is next.

Oh my… this was so good. I started reading at around 11 o'clock at night and read until half past one, when I went to sleep. But I desperately wanted to know what happened to Lacey and Evi, and Mark and all the others, so I got up again at 2 am and finished it at half past four in the morning. And then I could sleep.

Bolton has written a thriller that in the first short paragraphs might seem a bit confusing because she not only alternates events from the past with what's going on in the present , but she uses different voices to tell it too. However, soon you are drawn into the story, and you don't want to stop reading.

If you are looking for a good thriller and you have some time to continue reading, don't hesitate… This is the book for you.

Oh, this was so good and so beautiful. And although it was not really a thriller, it kept me turning the pages (on my e-reader, that is), because I waOh, this was so good and so beautiful. And although it was not really a thriller, it kept me turning the pages (on my e-reader, that is), because I wanted to find out the secret of Laurel's mother.I loved the descriptions of the relations between the brother and three sisters, and between them and their parents. I loved the story from the present and the story from the past (WO II and the fifties). I loved everything about this book.

First sentence: "If it were only true that all's well that ends well, if it were only true."

Last sentence: "She turns to the car, he following her, waFirst sentence: "If it were only true that all's well that ends well, if it were only true."

Last sentence: "She turns to the car, he following her, watching as she moves how she trails her faithful and lithe cloud of unknowing across the pavement."

From Schultreff.de: In 1944 Paul Hazlett is working in the Compound, a secret government department in Britain, which specialized in propaganda broadcasts over Europe. There he falls in love with Elsa Janovic who is also engaged with black propaganda and psychological warfare in this particular Compound. Other members of the Compound are Miles Bunting, Princes Xavier, Colonel Tylden and several prisoners of war. Among those POWs is Helmut Kiel, a German who has chosen to work for the enemy and is now broadcasting for the Compound. Elsa and Kiel happen to have a love affair and after a few months Kiel is sent back to the prison camp. From there he goes on the air in a prisoners of war exchange-of-greetings programme betraying the identity of the Compound, which was supposed to be an authentic underground German station. Six or seven years after war Kiel dies in prison. In late spring of 1944 Paul, Elsa and the other members of their intelligence unit gather in a hotel in London having just returned from a mission to the United States. Paul tells his colleagues that he has got a good job waiting for him in America and a place to stay for Elsa and him. The next day they get ready to go back to the country when a V-2 bomb hits them direct just as their train starts pulling out and Paul, Elsa, Princess Xavier, Miles Bunting and Colonel Tylden die. Paul believes to be the only survivor of the bomb attack although he is dead and after some time he imagines to live together with Elsa in an antiquated apartment by the East River in New York. He is convinced that he has dreamt up Elsa, who now is his wife, their children Pierre and Katerina and Princess Xavier. From a certain point on he is sure that those „imagined“ people have become real due to his imagination. In fact neither of them is real. They have risen from the dead or as in the case of Pierre and Katerina they never really existed. Nevertheless they live among people who are real and alive. They are even considered to be real persons by everyone else. Though there seems to be something wrong with Elsa. Paul realises that she is casting a shadow in the wrong direction; her shadow falls in a different angle to evryone else's shadow no matter from where the light shines upon her. In addition to that Elsa needs to meet he analyst quite often as she is departing from reason from time to time. She spends her day mainly by sitting by window and looking at the East River. Approximately 30 years after their death Elsa tells Paul that she has recognised a salesman in a shoe store to be Helmut Kiel. Paul does not believe her as he is certainly put out that Kiel died in prison and knowing that his wife is mad. But after proving her statement and having seen the man himself he believes that this certain person is Helmut Kiel although he ought to look much older. Paul now feels in danger from Kiel because he thinks that Kiel has returned to haunt him in order to take revenge for his imprisonment. Kiel calls himself Mueller and when Elsa goes back to the shoe store to talk to him he denies to be Kiel and claims that he was not yet born in 1944. Paul tells his son Pierre about Kiel but Pierre does not show any interest whereas Katerina is curious about Kiel.

In the end Paul is sitting in a bar watching a group of people consisting of Elsa, Princess Xavier, Kiel and Miles Bunting. When another man heads towards the group he knows that it is Colonel Tylden, another person from the Compound. Then Paul gets up, grasps Elsa's arm and pulls her out of the bar heading towards a night-club. This is when Elsa tells Paul that he also died in the bomb attack in 1944. When they realise that the group are following them they continue their escape through several discos and clubs. In a hotel they happen to arrive at the golden wedding of two old friends and afterwards they visit Pierre and Katerina telling them that they (Pierre and Katerina) do not exist. Finally Paul goes to see his oldest friend once more and at the very end Paul and Elsa stand in front of their apartment block at the East River seeing that the old building is pulled down in order to be replaced by a modern one. Just at that moment Princess Xavier, Kiel, Miles Bunting and Colonel Tylden pass by in a car and take Paul and Elsa back with them so that they can have peace.

I had never read anything written by Muriel Spark, although I knew her by name, so I really didn't know what to expect. But this novella totally came as a surprise. It took me a while to realise that everything was not what it seemed and that there was more to it than remembering a love-story from long ago. I thought this was so intriguing that I couldn't put the book down and read it in one sitting.

I will definitely read more books by Spark, because I like stories with a little unexpected twist, and I am curious to see if her other books are like that also....more

P. 99: ""She's at one baseline with a bucket at her feet, and Clarissa, at the other baseFirst sentence: "'Here', she says, 'I'll get you a sweater.'"

P. 99: ""She's at one baseline with a bucket at her feet, and Clarissa, at the other baseline, also has a bucket."

Last sentence: "Then he's there, her husband, coming down the stairs, his shoes making their syncopated beat, and she's looking up at him, anticipating his voice, waiting to see what comes next.'"

From Amazon: It’s July 4, 2005, and the Frankel family is descending upon their beloved summer home in the Berkshires. But this is no ordinary holiday. The family has gathered to memorialize Leo, the youngest of the four siblings, an intrepid journalist and adventurer who was killed on that day in 2004, while on assignment in Iraq. The parents, Marilyn and David, are adrift in grief. Their forty-year marriage is falling apart. Clarissa, the eldest sibling and a former cello prodigy, has settled into an ambivalent domesticity and is struggling at age thirty-nine to become pregnant. Lily, a fiery-tempered lawyer and the family contrarian, is angry at everyone. And Noelle, whose teenage years were shadowed by promiscuity and school expulsions, has moved to Jerusalem and become a born-again Orthodox Jew. The last person to see Leo alive, Noelle has flown back for the memorial with her husband and four children, but she feels entirely out of place. And Thisbe —Leo’s widow and mother of their three-year-old son—has come from California bearing her own secret. Set against the backdrop of Independence Day and the Iraq War, The World Without You is a novel about sibling rivalries and marital feuds, about volatile women and silent men, and, ultimately, about the true meaning of family.----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------I loved this book from the first pages and I enjoyed it all the way through. The Frankel family certainly has its problems, but everything is so recognizable and after a real short time it seems you know all these people well and you understand completely why they feel and act the way they do. They are real persons and they all struggle with something, be it grieve, jealousy, guilt, a bad relation, money problems, …, or themselves.

The book has no, what is generally called, good (or fairy) tale ending, and usually I don't like this very much. But the ending is hopeful and it is the right one for this book, because, hey, that's life… When human issues are involved, there can be no conclusive endings, but when everyone tries his best, there will always be hope.